I don’t know what to make of your super heated bees or spring flowers at 53 degrees North in December! We will not have any spring flowers in the frozen tundra here at 43 degrees North until at least the end of February. Even then it will just be a few snow crocuses. Nothing the bees can use until late March.

I checked on my bees yesterday. The top entrance hives had bees out on their front porches watching the snow. A couple of bees were flying, but most had enough sense just to watch the snow from inside. The top entrance hives should be cooler inside than my bottom entrance hives, but the top entrance hives are the only ones that had activity at the entrances.

In my long cold gray winter climate, I would speculate that a design where the bees get out on our few mild days may be better than one where they never get out. So far, the top entrance foam hives are proving more useful in that regards than the bottom entrance foam hives.